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It's time for the "best of the year" lists and The Boston Globe's Bob Blumenthal has included Professor Evan Ziporyn's "This is Not a Clarinet" on his compilation of best CDs. "MIT's avant avatar lets us know that we separate new jazz and new 'classical' at our peril," Blumenthal wrote.

"Many people who go to the MIT Symphony's concerts have probably thought to themselves: This orchestra must have a higher collective IQ than any other," began Richard Buell's Boston Globe review of MITSO's Dec. 8 concert. "Bright, conscientious, spirited performances are the ensemble's proven norm. Saturday night at Kresge Auditorium you also got the distinct impression--not for the first time--that the thornier the assignment, the better this group likes it." Buell also praised Professor Peter Child's "Jubal," which the orchestra performed, as "feisty, inventive, highly colored and purposeful." He continued, "In a juster world, 'Jubal' would immediately be making its way onto the major-league big-orchestra circuit."

Bill Arning, curator of the List Visual Arts Center, has jurored and guest curated "The 17th Drawing Show" on view at the Mills Gallery (Boston Center for the Arts, 539 Tremont St., Boston) through Feb. 10. For this year's show, he stretched the boundaries of drawing by inviting artists to submit work that could "make a case as a drawing, whether or not it fits any standard definition." The works selected range from ultratraditional realistic charcoal renderings to mixed media, video projection, photocopies and sculptural objects. The 113 artists presenting works in the show (culled from 312 applicants) include Magda Fernandez, senior office assistant in the Office of the Arts; Kelly Heaton, who earned an S.M. from the Media Lab in 2000; and Cree Bruins, a gallery attendant at the List Center. Arning will give a curator's talk at the Boston Center for the Arts on Thursday, Jan. 10 at 6 p.m.

Butoh dancer Min Tanaka earned praise from The Boston Herald for his Dec. 12 performance to Yoko Ono's music at the List Visual Arts Center "His extraordinary show at MIT was unquestionably a night to remember," wrote Theodore Bale.

A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on December 19, 2001.